passed on from hand to hand through a dozen
pairs when it reached Uncle Dick, who seized it, hurled it up against
the grimy windows of the works, and then passed it to the first man of
the second row.

In a minute or two the men were working like a great machine, the pails
being dipped and running, or rather being swung, from hand to hand till
they reached Uncle Dick, who dashed the water over the windows, and here
and there, while the empty buckets ran back to Uncle Jack.

The men thoroughly enjoyed it, and Pannell shouted that this would be
the way to put out a fire. But my uncles did not take up the idea,
working steadily on, and shifting the line till the whole of the glazed
windows had been sluiced, and a lot of the grit and rubbish washed away
from the sills and places, after which the buckets were again slung in a
row and the men had their beer, said "Good-night!" quite cheerily, and
went away.

"There," said Uncle Dick, "I call that business. How well the lads
worked!"

"Yes," said Uncle Jack with a sigh of content as he wiped his streaming
brow; "we could not have got on with them like that three months ago."

"No," said Uncle Bob, who had been looking on with me, and keeping dry;
"the medicine is working faster and faster; they are beginning to find
us out."

"Yes," said Uncle Dick. "I think we may say it is peace now."

"Don't be in too great a hurry, my boys," said Uncle Jack. "There is a
good deal more to do yet."

It is one of the terrible misfortunes of a town like Arrowfield that
accidents among the work-people are so common. There was an excellent
hospital there, and it was too often called into use by some horror or
another.

It would be a terrible tale to tell of the mishaps that we heard of from
week to week: men burned by hot twining rods; by the falling of masses
of iron or steel that were being forged; by blows of hammers; and above
all in the casting-shops, when glowing fluid metal was poured into some
mould which had not been examined to see whether it was free from water.

Do you know what happens then? Some perhaps do not. The fluid metal
runs into the mould, and in an instant the water is turned into steam,
by whose mighty power the metal is sent flying like a shower, the mould
rent to pieces, and all who are within range are horribly burned.

That steam is a wonderful slave, but what a master! It is kept bound in
strong fetters by those who force its obedience; but woe t